Read This Week
This is my 14th Read This Week feature! Check these articles out…good stuff:
@SonofBaldwin wrote a great short essay about the perception of “the closet” for LGBT people and how that phrase is inadequate in the attempt to describe the challenges of such an experience. It’s worth the read. In fact, why aren’t you already following him on Tumblr? Get to it!
I Don’t Tell Black People I’m Atheist by Bridgette Gaudette is a great read. I…totally understand her stance. Even when you are a believer and you question even the smallest (let alone the news headline-making large) problems within the Black church, let alone question the existence of deities, you’re in for a fight and possible social alienation. Sometimes, this space is hard to navigate.
Race and Gender in Higher Education - Who Gets Degrees? by Laura Noren is an interesting read. In EVERY documented racial group, women earn MORE degrees than MEN. This is not solely a “Black issue,” since it is often suggested that Black women earning degrees makes us “non-marriage material.” The study points out that the women to men gap in Bachelor’s degrees earned (from 2009-2010) was 32% for Black women, 22% for Hispanic women, 12% for White women, and 10% for Asian women. (I recently wrote two posts about gender/race biases and the perception of “useless degrees”lists as well as hierarchies among these same lists.)
White Supremacy - The New National Security Threat by Khaled A. Beydoun of Al Jazeera is an interesting and truthful read. He comments the way that so many writers and bloggers on Tumblr have about this label of “terrorism” being used as a slur for brown people, NOT as an accurate label for the politicized actions of White male terrorists. My only critiques are 2 things. One: This is NOT “new.” I’d have liked that to not be in the title. Two: “While such hate groups have not taken on a single act of violence as prominent at the 9/11 attacks..” is not true. The notion that 9/11 is the worst act of terrorism and genocide on Americans is only true if we ignore the history of this country and the systematic violence against brown bodies, and exclude brown bodies from being included as “Americans.” Even so, the article is still worth a read. Good stuff.
Stay tuned for next week’s suggestions! Also, if you’ve read some good articles that I may have not read (I may have, but didn’t post them in a Read This Week feature), tweet me anytime at @thetrudz.
